Water conservation is an increasingly important social issue as populations increase in urbanized areas and variable weather patterns create geographic areas of “water stress.” Measuring soil moisture is important for agricultural applications to help farmers manage their irrigation systems more efficiently. Knowing the exact soil moisture conditions on their fields, not only are farmers able to generally use less water to grow a crop, they are also able to increase yields and the quality of the crop by improved management of soil moisture during critical plant growth stages. In urban and suburban areas, landscapes and residential lawns are using soil moisture sensors to interface with an irrigation controller. Connecting a soil moisture sensor to a simple irrigation clock will convert it into a “smart” irrigation controller that prevents irrigation cycles when the soil is already wet, e.g., following a recent rainfall event. In other situations, golf courses are using soil moisture sensors to increase the efficiency of their irrigation systems to prevent over-watering and leaching of fertilizers and other chemicals into the ground. Resistive/conductive sensors rely on the resistive/conductive property of moist soils and consist of at least two electrodes inserted into the soil and a means to measure the resistance/conductance between these electrodes. The resistive/conductive property of soils changes with its composition. Properties such as salinity and acidity greatly affect resistive/conductive readings and for this type of sensor to be effective, a comparative method is required to calibrate the sensor to the soil. Dielectric sensors consist of a known material that is located between at least two plate electrodes. The material becomes the dielectric of the sensor. The sensor is placed in contact with the soil to be measured and by contact the dielectric material becomes moist. The capacitance or resistance of the resultant sensor is measured. These types of sensors provide immunity to the composition of the soil but suffer from a limited useful life since the dielectric material degrades with time. Additionally, these sensors suffer from slow response since the dielectric material takes time to reach the same moisture level as the surrounding soil. The present technology seeks to optimize the use of soil moisture sensors that interface with irrigation controllers to overcome deficiencies in prior art systems.